Niche CRM vendor StayinFront has been in the industry for 20 years. Although slightly under the radar, StayinFront has a long history of providing on-premises solutions globally - largely to the pharmaceutical industry. This week, the vendor has announced a new prescription for its CRM solution. With its newly announced EdgeRX solution, StayinFront, is extending its expertise to the Web and will be joining other CRM vendors in the cloud. According to Ken Arbadji, StayinFront's vice president of North American sales, 70 percent of StayinFront's customers play in the pharmaceutical space and although considered a more technologically traditional vertical, pharma companies are now asking for on-demand solutions.

"It's kind of inevitable," says Dale Hagemeyer, an analyst specializing in the CRM in pharma space for Gartner Research. "These guys are positioned in the mid-tier so being able to have a hosted solution as well as on premises seems to be the ticket." Arbadji notes that the vendor has offered Web access to its customers, but the EdgeRx solution is the complete package on demand. "We've had these [Web] models in the past," Arbadji says. "Now what we are trying to do is package all these things together as the SaaS-based model becomes the more popular." He maintains, however, that customers - especially those in pharma - need the flexibility of going offline and online with the CRM software. The on-demand version allows users to do so - and provides quite a bit of customization.

Hagemeyer says that customization is something that pharma companies know and love - also a reason that many companies have been content with on-premises software. "They can't keep their hands off it," he says, adding that many pharma companies have the money to do so, too. With that in mind, Hagemeyer says, on-premises solutions within pharma will never dissipate. With the ability to customize as a goal, the EdgeRx product permits users to create specifications and play around with configurable settings.

StayinFront's position as a mid-tier company makes it all-that-more important to offer flexibility - both with its ease of use and with its delivery models, Hagemeyer says. In pharma you have a couple of really big players - notably Oracle and Cegedim Dendrite - he says. StayinFront is the next step down from those mega-vendors. Interestingly, he notes, that once you start moving down even further, you start looking at regional players.

"The good thing about it is that one size does not fit all - even within a company," Hagemeyer says. "How you operate in the U.S may not be how you operate in [another country] and you may need flexibility. You can choose a vendor and have different solutions from that vendor."

Because of StayinFront's size, "They'll do more with you," Hagemeyer says. "With the services they offer it isn't just 'take it or leave it.' It's, 'I want some of this and not some of that.' You can craft it any way you want." Additionally, subscribers can add on additional support functionality. The EdgeRx solution is to be priced on a per user per month basis.

Arbadji says he reckons that EdgeRx will mostly attract new customers, especially those with more restricted budgets. He notes that in the pharma space, StayinFront is generally seeing fewer implementations than in previous years. "[EdgeRx] is something companies will absolutely look at and be considering," he says adding that younger businesses will likely find EdgeRx the most attractive.

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